The Virgin's Lover Read online

  “Father?” she said softly.

  “Tell it to God and then to me,” he said gently, and let her go in before him.

  He waited at the back of the church, busying himself quietly until she rose from her knees and sat in the pew seat, and only then did he go to her. “Trouble?” he asked.

  “I have angered my husband on another matter,” she said simply. “And so I failed to plead for our bishop.”

  He nodded. “Don’t reproach yourself for that,” he said. “I think there is nothing any of us can do. The queen is to be called supreme governor of the church. All the bishops have to bow down to her.”

  “Supreme governor?” Amy repeated. “But how can she?”

  “They say that she does no more than claim the title of her brother and her father,” he said. “They don’t say that she is a woman and filled with a woman’s frailties. They don’t say how a woman, bound by God to be the handmaiden to her husband, cursed by God for the first sin, can be supreme governor.”

  “What will happen?” Amy asked in a little thread of sound.

  “I am afraid she will burn the bishops,” he said steadily. “Already Bishop Bonner is arrested, and one by one, as they refuse to kneel to her, the others will be taken.”

  “And our bishop? Bishop Thomas?”

  “He will go like the others, like a lamb to the slaughter,” the priest said. “A great darkness is going to come over this country and you and I, daughter, can do nothing more than pray.”

  “If I can speak to Robert, I will,” she promised. She hesitated, remembering his rapid departure, and the rage in his voice. “He is a great man now, but he knows what it is to be a prisoner, in fear of your life. He is merciful. He will not advise the queen to destroy these holy men.”

  “God bless you,” the priest said. “There will be few who dare to speak.”

  “And what about you?” she asked. “Will you have to take an oath as well?”

  “Once they have finished with the bishops they will come for men like me,” he said certainly. “And I shall have to be ready. If I can stay, I will. I am sworn to serve these people, this is my parish, this is my flock. The good shepherd does not leave his sheep. But if they want me to take an oath which says that she is Pope then I don’t see how I can do it. The words would choke me. I will have to take my punishment as better men than me are doing now.”

  “They will murder you for your faith?”

  He spread out his hands. “If they must.” “Father, what will become of us all?” Amy asked. He shook his head. “I wish I knew.”

  Robert Dudley, storming into court in no very sweet temper, found the place strangely quiet. The presence chamber held only a sprinkling of ladies and gentlemen of the court, and a handful of lesser gentry.

  “Where is everyone?” he demanded of Laetitia Knollys, who was seated in a window bay ostentatiously reading a book of sermons.

  “I am here,” she said helpfully.

  He scowled at her. “I meant anyone of any importance.”

  “Still me,” she said, not at all dashed. “Still here.”

  Reluctantly, he laughed. “Mistress Knollys, do not try my patience, I have had a long hard ride from one damnably stubborn and stupid woman to another. Do not you make a third.”

  “Oh?” she said, opening her dark eyes very wide. “Who has been so unfortunate as to offend you, Sir Robert? Not your wife?”

  “No one that need concern you. Where is the queen?”

  “Out with Sir William Pickering. He has returned to England, did you know?”

  “Of course I knew. We are old friends.”

  “Don’t you adore him? I think he is the most handsome man I have ever seen in my life.”

  “Absolutely,” Dudley said. “Are they riding?”

  “No, walking. It’s more intimate, don’t you think?”

  “Why aren’t you with them?”

  “Nobody is with them.”

  “Her other ladies?”

  “No. Really, nobody. She and Sir William are quite alone today as they have been for the last three days. We all think it’s a certainty.”

  “It?”

  “Their betrothal. She cannot keep her eyes off him. He cannot keep his hands off her. It’s such a love story. Like a ballad. It is Guinevere and Arthur, it truly is!”

  “She will never marry him,” Dudley said, with more certainty than he was feeling.

  “Why should she not? He’s the best-looking man in Europe, he’s as rich as an emperor, he has no interest in politics or power so she can rule as she wants, and he has neither enemies in England nor a wife. I would have thought he was perfect.”

  Robert turned from her, unable to speak for rage, and almost collided with Sir William Cecil. “Your pardon, Lord Secretary. I was just leaving.”

  “I thought you had just arrived.”

  “Leaving to go to my rooms,” Robert said, biting the inside of his mouth to contain his temper.

  “I am glad you are back,” Cecil said, walking beside him. “We have needed your counsel.”

  “I thought no work had been done at all.”

  “Your counsel with the queen,” Cecil said flatly. “This whirlwind courtship may suit Her Grace, but I am not sure if it is beneficial for the country.”

  “Have you told her that?”

  “Not I!” Cecil said with a little chuckle. “She is a young woman in love. I rather thought you might tell her.”

  “Why me?”

  “Well, not tell her. I thought you might distract her. Divert her. Remind her that there are many handsome men in the world. She does not have to marry the first one that comes free.”

  “I’m a married man,” Robert said bleakly. “In case you forgot. I can hardly compete with a bachelor dripping in gold.”

  “You are right to remind me,” Cecil said blandly, charging tack. “Because if he marries her both of us will be able to go home to our wives. He won’t want us advising her. He will put in his own favorites. Our work at court will be over. I can go home to Burghley at last, and you can go home to…” He broke off, if surprised to remember that Robert had no great family estate. “Wherever you choose, I suppose.”

  “I will hardly build a Burghley with my present savings,” Dudley said furiously.

  “No. Perhaps it would be better for both of us if Pickering were to have a rival. If he were to be troubled. If he were not to have everything quite his own way. Easy for him to be smiling and pleasant when he rides a straight road without competition.”

  Dudley sighed, as a man weary of nonsense. “I am going to my rooms.”

  “Shall I see you at dinner?”

  “Of course I shall come to dinner.”

  Cecil smiled. “I am very glad to see you back at court,” he said sweetly.

  The queen sent a dish of venison down the hall to Sir William Pickering’s table, and, even-handed, sent a very good game pie to Robert Dudley’s table. When the boards had been cleared and the musicians struck up she danced with one man and then the other. Sir William sulked after a little of this treatment; but Robert Dudley was at his most debonair, and the queen was radiant. Robert Dudley stood up for a dance with Laetitia Knollys and had the pleasure of hearing the Spanish ambassador remark to the queen what a handsome couple they were together. He watched the queen pale with anger. Shortly after, she called for a pack of cards and Dudley bet her the pearl in his hat that he would have won on points by midnight. The two went head to head as if there were no one else in the room, no one else in the world; and Sir William Pickering retired early to bed.

  July 1st 1559 Dear William,

  Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, ambassador to Paris, addressed Cecil in a coded letter, freshly delivered by a hard-pressed messenger. Incredible news. The king has, this very day, been wounded in a jousting tournament and the surgeons are with him now. The word I hear is that they are not hopeful; the blow may be fatal. If he dies, there is no doubt that the kingdom of France will be ruled in ev